Darkoshi

It took me all day to clean out one small box out of many that I have around the house. This one had a few items I brought back from Qiao's house after breaking up with him. Deciding what to do with each item. Where to put them, and which things not to keep. It takes me forever.

The dog tags were the hardest. I finally found a small cushioned box to keep them in.

The colorful shiny metallic foil chocolate wrappers compacted into various shapes, I put together with others, in a bigger box with clear lid.

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I came across the receipt of a 14" flat CRT TV and a Memorex DVD player I bought from Sears in 2006. The TV cost $99. The DVD player cost only $34.99! Both prices were much less than I would have guessed. I still have the TV in a bedroom though I rarely use it. My mom has the DVD player; I have other DVD players now.

I also have a large CRT TV which used to be Qiao's; he didn't want it anymore. As well as an extra LED TV which I was going to replace the CRT with. But the CRT TV turns on instantly while the LED TV (a Toshiba FireTV - avoid them is my advice) sometimes takes several minutes. I suppose I will eventually get rid of the CRT. I don't know if I can find someone local who would want it, considering it still works. I might have to pay someone to take it to the dump. Or take it myself if it's not the horrible smelling landfill place that it would need to go to.

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On the coffee table is a row of audio cassettes, on which I had copied music for Qiao back when he had a vehicle that played cassettes. I still have the original copies of the music; I don't need the cassettes. So I don't know what to do with them, and they sit there and sit there. I could erase them and take them to Goodwill, I guess? I have occasionally seen home-recorded tapes like that at Goodwill which weren't erased. But I don't think I'd do that.... Hmm, then again what could it hurt. They won't have my name. They won't follow me home to arrest me for having copied copyrighted music to audio cassettes, and then having given the cassettes away.

If someone wants the cassettes for recording their own music to, they can record over them. And if they get a kick out of listening to the music that's already on them, that's great too. But cassettes are old tech; few people would probably want them either way.

Well good, that's one decision made, and an easy solution. Give them to Goodwill in a box along with other stuff I've already put aside to take there.

I browsed through a Goodwill store. The music CDs were the first thing to catch my eye; I looked through some of them. I don't really want CDs as that requires me ripping the music to MP3 files, and leaves me with a physical CD left over taking up space. But it reminds me of the old days, looking at CDs in stores and taking a chance on some, buying them, never knowing for sure how much I was going to like the music until I got home to listen to it.

One of the CDs that caught my eye was in a foreign language. It looked like Finnish to me, but I wasn't sure. The name on it was Yva plus a last name that I don't remember. It may have started with B. The back side had a picture of someone (presumably Yva the singer) in a blue and white outfit, similar to a traditional Bavarian style dirndl.
Another CD had music from RiverDance.

I didn't end up getting any CDs. I browsed the rest of the store, intending to possibly stop by the CD rack again afterward if I hadn't talked myself out of it by then. But then as I walked by the registers in the direction of both the entrance and the CDs (I'm not sure anymore which I was headed for), the lone cashier there said 'goodbye' or 'have a nice day' or something like that to me. Then when I thought of the CDs, it seemed awkward to stay and look at them again when {goodbyes had already been made}. I stopped in the sunshine of the open doorway and checked my phone messages, mentally debating it. Decided to leave.

At home I looked up this singer Yva. I only found an English singer and a Lithuanian group by that name.
Maybe it was this album by the Lithuanian group Yva, but I don't think so. I think the CD I looked at had only 1 person on it, not 3. And I remember there being a last name along with the Yva. It seemed like an older album. I don't remember what was on the front of the CD. Oh well. I probably wouldn't have liked the music anyway.

..

I came across this name website:
https://www.nameuc.com/talon-name-meaning-origin-popularity/

It has a different pretty image for each name. They are fairly obviously generated by an AI/LLM/whatever it is called for images. A while later I realized the text of the site must have also been generated by a LLM too. (It sounds quite similar to the answers I got when I asked an LLM questions about names.) That indicates to me that the data listed for the names on that site is not very trustworthy. If it hadn't been for the novel pretty name pictures, I might not have noticed/realized that. Many of the other name sites I've come across this last year or more have been similar, I suppose, just without the images. Sigh. How are we going to filter the junk data from the accurate data?

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Apparently the aurora was visible even near here in South Carolina on Friday night. I didn't read/hear about it until this morning when the sun was already starting to rise. I never imagined an aurora could/would be visible this far south. I remember seeing the crescent moon in the sky earlier while I was out shopping. The sky was normal, not ablaze with colors.

I am returning a pair of solid bike tires I bought as the size listed in the product description does not match what was sent. The tires are fairly heavy and bulky so I feel it would be prudent to put some buffer material in the box to keep them from thumping around when the box is transported.

Of the fitting buffer material I have on hand, I could either use a heart-shaped mylar Valentine's balloon, or 2 pieces of nice sturdy styrofoam.

I feel weird about putting a Valentine's balloon in the package, even though it would be a good way to get rid of it. (I would feel bad about throwing it away which is why it is still lingering around here in August.)

I feel oddly clingy about the nice sturdy styrofoam because when I wave them in my hands they make a nice breeze, and maybe they'd be good to use as a support for something.

So which shall it be? I think the balloon.

But the styrofoam would be more logical and it would be a good way to get rid of it too.

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Ah hah! A third option has presented itself - a smaller box that fits inside the bigger box. But then I'd be getting rid of neither the balloon nor the styrofoam and this would be the perfect opportunity...

I found this cute and colorful ruffly skirt at Target in the Pride section (it looks so good on the model on that page!). I passed on by with an admiring glance, but came across another one while browsing for knee shorts. You know, like a sign that I should at least have some fun trying it on. The dressing rooms were already closed. But when I held it up against myself in a mirror, it looked so good together with the contrasting colors of my shirt and socks, that into my cart it went.

I find skirts to be impractical, but ruffly ones are fun.

I haven't been keeping close track of the local face mask mandates. But I'm of the impression they've been suspended for the time being. When I went shopping today, I expected not to see anyone else wearing face masks. I planned to wear mine anyhow, and figured people would think I was odd. So, like usual, right?, I thought in reply. But I decided to wear my not-as-tight KN-95 instead of the most protective one.

There were actually a lot of people wearing face masks; not only store employees but other customers too. It seemed like more people were wearing face masks today than last year or the year before.

I bought a can of mushy peas to see what they are like, in spite of the ingredients including artificial color. That would have been a fitting thing to eat on St. Patrick's Day. And if I'd thought of it earlier in the month, I could have put my green fairy lights on the porch.

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Among the things I've read about Ukraine was a comment by a local, "The fasting has started", in reference to food supplies being tight. It's a grim thought, in addition to everything else.

Lately I've noticed text like the following on various product packages, while out shopping:
"The ... trademark used under license". Along with that, it lists another company name; the company which bought the license to use the trademark on their package.

For example, I've seen LED holiday lights in packages that show the "GE" or "PHILIPS" logos on them, and on the back or side of the box is this small text that says those trademarks are used under license.

Until now when I've see those logos on a product, it made me think that it must be a good product because it's made by GE or Philips, who surely (or hopefully any way) have good design and quality control. But now I'm realizing that the big-name companies don't have anything to do with a lot of these products; they're just making money by letting other companies use their name & logo on products.

Trademark Licensing: Everything You Need to Know

I've sometimes wondered why some shopping receipts have smudgy lines of red or pink ink on them.

Answer: It's an end of roll warning stripe.

More:
https://www.reddit.com/r/TalesFromRetail/comments/5nvl5h/pink_lines_and_their_apparent_befuddlement_of_the/

It's only been 19 years since it came out, but I've finally watched the Lilo and Stitch movie (I'd wanted to for a long time). I enjoyed it.

I know there are several more movies and a TV series - I saw an episode of the latter once. At this rate it will take me decades to watch the rest, if ever.

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I went grocery shopping yesterday. When I got home, I realized that all the fruit I bought was orange. Loquats, a papaya, a mango, a satsuma mandarin, apricots.

At Target a few weeks ago, they had a couple of racks near the entrance with cloth face-masks for sale. Not having seen that in a physical store before, I thought it was great and started browsing through them. But all the ones with pretty colors and patterns were for children, child-sized. The ones for adults were bland boring colors.

I saw a school bus drive by today and realized it's been so long since I've seen school buses. Unlike the past, I didn't hear a cacophony of children yelling as it went by. Though I'm not sure if I had the house windows open at the time or not.

My mom stopped by and talked to me on the porch. She had a cloth face mask on which kept slipping down under her nose. So I guess all those people you see on TV and in photos with masks under their noses aren't necessarily, maybe not even mainly, wearing them that way on purpose. Do they sell small clips that people could just snap onto ear loops to make them tighter? Or what else works well for that? On one of mine that was too loose, I sewed the loops tighter. On another I used safety pins. I suppose stapling them might work, if the straps are wide enough.

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Charleston County Sheriff's Election:

Kristin Graziano won a historic bid to unseat the longtime incumbent, Al Cannon, who has been sheriff in Charleston County since 1988. She is the first woman and first openly gay person elected to serve as a county sheriff in South Carolina.

I already broke the tongs!

They are the metal kind with a spring in the end, but they were closed up with no obvious way to open them*. So I pulled on the ends, applying force, and got them to open a small amount (which would have been good enough). But then I decided that having them open further would be better, so I pulled harder, and the rivet holding it together broke!

I don't know if the label had instructions, but I don't think so. When I got to the checkout counter yesterday (right before the store closing time), the tongs were missing the label with the bar code and price. It was just a small square of cardboard clipped on with a plastic thread, so it might have fallen off somewhere, or maybe it was missing to begin with. I walked back very quickly to get another tong for the cashier to scan, and told her she could give me the one without the label.

I specifically chose those tongs as they were the only ones without plastic or rubber on them. I don't want plastic as it could get scratched up, and wouldn't be good in case I wanted to use the tongs for pulling something out of flames. I don't want rubber as rubber things tend to get sticky as they age around here, due to the humidity.

(That's another thing I wanted to gripe about. Aloe gel-based hand sanitizers leave my hands sticky even after rubbing them a long time. Even after they start feeling dry, they become sticky again when I touch something like my car's steering wheel. And god forbid it rains and I touch something wet - the residue on my hands turns to slime.)

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It looks like it's about to rain too, and I haven't even showered yet. Not conducive for baggie-buying.
What to do, what to do?!


*Based on one of the online reviews, the tongs have a locking device on the end: "pull up for closing and push down for open"
Damn, so that is how it works. Would have been good to know. I should be able to fix them if I can find something to replace the rivet with, and if I can get the spring to stay in place while trying to re-assemble it.